Guilty Pleasures
by Orihime Maychan
Summary: Over-thinking has been one of her secret talents, which spewed out of her boredom of things normal and ordinary. A short musing on things left unsaid. Please read on. Rated T because I don't know.


**Guilty Pleasures**

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She still thinks about him every day. It was her single guilty pleasure after she tucks her little brother at night. Having someone you can rely on (somehow) or show affection to (in a way), or (even if it was a tiny glimmer of it) trust fully can do wonders, and she owes it to him so much chances to be herself, to let her inner self shine through the icy armor that she reserves to the rest of the world. It made her whole, it felt complete, and it made her feel invincible. But after seeing him deal with so many problems that their nation created, and realizing that creating (or breaking) family ties are one of the strongest keys to learning how to rule the nation properly, she had to let him go, bit by bit.

The idea that what her ex-fiancé had to find something to bring closure to himself came to her sometime before detaching herself from him, so even if it just choked the life out of her, to let a chunk of her heart set itself loose from her chest, and even so far as to wear her icy armor again, she gave him a chance to redeem himself. His decision of leaving her without any kind of communication made it easy for her to find reasons to leave him, but deep inside of her she knew: even if he kept making the dumb mistakes over and over again, she can easily forgive him. Heck, if saving his ass off in exchange for her life from Uncle Wei's super-tight security prison wasn't the proof of her uncanny ability to love or forgive, she doesn't know what is. For all she knows, he had so much pain to go through, more than she can ever fathom, and that knowledge kept her feelings for him intact. But still, even if keeping him beside her was the most selfish thing she could have done, she didn't. She already had her closure, she somehow made peace with her family, even taking Tom-tom out to play and be himself from time to time. Or mostly, just to make peace with Tom-tom and see him run around and laugh and cry and be himself, in a way she was giving him a gift that Uncle Wei was able to share with her so many years ago.

But the Fire Lord had nothing left, his only two blood-relations were imprisoned, if not by steel bars, by the judgment of the Four Nations, and worse than that, he had no idea where his mother really is. Uncle Iroh is his only family now, and while he can live with having just a few caring people at his disposal, he just, can't. Not without knowing where Princess Ursa was will never give him any peace of mind, no matter how much she tried within her means to keep him safe, sane, and satiated. Even before he even realized it, Mai already had these things figured out. Over-thinking throughout her life made it easy, and it's a habit she can't simply break, not without the results justifying its existence. The only thing she didn't expect to happen was that the pain she felt after getting his stupid letter during the day of the eclipse was nothing compared to the pain she had to experience over and over again after she left him in the Royal Throne room dumb-founded and fuming. It was truly her fault this time, for losing it. She had to do it, but it never meant that she liked whatever self-sacrificing thing she had to do. Being good at hiding her true emotions was never enjoyable, and neither was her pretending to be deeply-gashed by his secret meetings with the dethroned Fire Lord. But still, there were things that she just simply had to do. Not for honor, not for worldly things, but simply for love.

-End-

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A/N: The title is misleading. This is a one-shot idea I spun out while trying to work on "Flower Shop Mai", and this is a bunch of words about Mai's thoughts before and after leaving the Fire Lord (aka he-who-must-not-be-mentioned-till-Bryke-brings-rea l-closure-to-this-cannon-pairing). Now it's too obvious that I'm so gay for MAIKO and too darn proud to renounce it). I like many cannon pairings, they're nice. XD Please share the love, not the hate. Reviews, comments, or reads would be nice too. =)


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